Claws Of Power Equipment System

The store page calls it equipment matching: try different combinations to maximise a cat’s abilities. Garlic Sprouts’ November 2025 post is more specific: each cat has 1–2 equipment slots, and the same item can feel totally different on two cats.

This page does not invent Claw Attachments, Ear Crests, Iron Shards, or a five-tier colour forge. Those names never appeared in Steam news. What did appear is listed below, with the patch that added or changed it.

How slots work

Default: one or two slots per cat. The August 23, 2026 update added one additional equipment slot for A-Dai, Fat Cat, Xiaofu, and Big Orange. If you are choosing who to gear first after that patch, those four can wear more than the rest of the roster.

The August 25 update improved equipment replacement: click a slot to replace the equipped item directly. The “Update Notice” around launch also added an Equipment panel shortcut on the map screen so you can manage gear without digging through menus. If you do not see the shortcut, update the Steam build — the last public depot bump on SteamDB was August 29, 2026.

Missing gear after a patch was a real bug. The August 29 notes “fixed the issue where some players experienced missing equipment.” If a slot looks empty after an update, patch first, then re-equip.

Named equipment from Steam

• Thick Iron Armor — demo update, August 7, 2026. Listed as new equipment next to Hand of God, idle system, multilingual support, and Steam Cloud. No official armor value was published.
• Midas Touch — August 23, 2026. Starter equipment. When equipped, enemies drop twice as much gold. The same patch doubled Hard Mode gold. Together they are the official farm loop: finish the 93-stage campaign, enter Hard Mode, wear Midas Touch.
• Clone Shovel — August 26, 2026, added to Stage 7. After accumulating a certain number of attacks, it has a chance to create a clone that assists in battle. The August 27 notes fixed a missing Clone Shovel icon. If the icon is blank, you are on a build older than August 27.

David the Magician interacts with gear: a launch-week “Update Notice” fixed lifesteal and stun effects granted by equipment that were not triggering on him. If you put lifesteal or stun pieces on David, you need that patch.

Developer examples of matching

From the November 2025 post:

• The cheapest Bacon Jack feels weak late — HP and ATK gear turn him into a tiny gremlin.
• +ATK and +CRIT on Chi Wulang can push his 200% opening slash into a one-hit delete on a mid-game unit. The “30+ damage” figure is the developer’s example, not a patch table.

That is the matching game: put sustain on Jacks you plan to fuse (see Jack Fusion Device), put burst on Chi Wulang, put gold on whoever survives the longest if you are wearing Midas Touch, put Clone Shovel on a cat that actually lands a lot of hits (Solo’s piercing shots, Xiao Fu’s fork, a fused Jack Hero).

What equipment is not

It is not bound to one cat forever in any official note — the August 25 replacement flow implies you can swap. It is not a ranked-PvP stat stick, because the game is single-player. It is not unlocked by “star rank 5.” Promotion stars were never mentioned in Steam copy.

Socket gems are a separate store-page pillar (“Socket Gems — conquer one stronghold after another”). Steam has not published a gem socket UI guide, so this page will not invent socket colours. When a patch names them, they will land here and on Release notes.

A sane upgrade order

1. Patch to August 29 or later so missing-equipment and David bugs are gone.
2. Pick up Clone Shovel on Stage 7 during the campaign.
3. Put Midas Touch on a cat you actually deploy in gold-heavy fights, especially Hard Mode.
4. Spend extra slots on A-Dai, Fat Cat, Xiaofu, and Big Orange before you stack third pieces on everyone else.
5. Use the map shortcut between stages instead of returning to a nested menu.

For item buttons you press in combat, use How to Use Items. For who deserves the next piece, use the Cat list.